Changing News Changing Realities Media Censorship’S Evolution in Egypt

Total Page:16

File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb

Changing News Changing Realities Media Censorship’S Evolution in Egypt ReuteRs InstItute for the study of JouRnalIsm Changing News Changing Realities media censorship’s evolution in egypt Abdalla F. Hassan Changing News Changing Realities Changing News Changing Realities media censorship’s evolution in egypt Abdalla F. Hassan Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism University of Oxford Research sponsored by the Gerda Henkel Foundation Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism Department of Politics and International Relations University of Oxford 13 Norham Gardens Oxford OX2 6PS United Kingdom http://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk Copyright © 2013 by Abdalla F. Hassan Design by Sally Boylan and Adam el-Sehemy Cover photographs by Abdalla F. Hassan, Joshua Stacher, and Lesley Lababidi The newspapers’ sting at first seemed slight and was conveniently disregarded, but its cumulative effect proved dangerous. By aggressively projecting political messages to its readers and generating active political debate among an expanding reading public . the press helped create a climate for political action that would eventually undermine the British hold on the country. (Ami Ayalon, The Press in the Arab Middle East) For Teta Saniya, my parents, and siblings with love, and for all those brave souls and unsung heroes who have sacrificed so much so that others can live free Contents Acknowledgments xi Preface:TheStateandtheMedia 1 I: Since the Printing Press 5 1. PressBeginningsinEgypt 7 2. NasserandtheEraofPan-Arabism 29 3. Sadat,theInfitah,andPeacewithIsrael 63 II: The Media and the Mubarak Era 79 4. Mubarak’sThree-DecadeCaretakerPresidency 81 5. Television’sComingofAge 119 6. BarriersBroken:Censorship’sLimits 137 7. FreeExpressionversustheRighttoBark 189 III: Revolution and Two and a Half Years On 221 8. NoGoingBack:FirstFourDayofRevolution 223 9. SustainingtheRevolution 265 10.TheMediaafterMubarak’sDownfall 315 11.What’sChanged?PoliticsandthePress underMilitaryRule 355 12.Mubarak2.0:RevolutionariesversustheGenerals 433 13.FallofMilitaryRule,theIslamists, andtheWeightofWords 541 14.Conclusion:LessonsfromEgypt’sExperience withCensorship 649 Bibliography 669 ix Acknowledgments am grateful to my parents for all they have given me. From the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, I would like I to thank David Levy, James Painter, John Lloyd, Sara Kalim, Alex Reid, Kate Hanneford-Smith, Amanda Armstrong, Anne Geniets, and Angela Julian. Eugene Rogan, director of the Middle East Centre at St Anthony’s College, has been an extremely help- ful and supportive adviser and always a pleasure to exchange ideas with. Most of all, I am grateful to my fellow fellows at the Reuters Institute and to everyone who has taken the time to be interviewed for this research. I have learnt so much from them. My thanks to Norman G. Finkelstein, David Levy, and James Painter for their suggestions on earlier versions; Jane Robson for her copy-edit of the manuscript; Sally Boylan for her layout design; Joshua Stacher, Elijah Zarwan, Lesley Lababidi, Andrew Sultana, the Dominican Institute for Oriental Studies (IDÉO), and the Bibliotheca Alexandrina for use of their photographs; Carlos Latuff for use of his cartoons; and Norman G. Finkelstein, Craig Duff, Lawrence Pintak, Doug Tarnopol, Jennifer Alejandro, Sally Boylan, Brian Childs, Jason Thompson, Courtney Kealy and Adam el-Sehemy for their support and encouragement. I am honoured to have been a fellow at the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism and I am indebted to the Gerda xi xii Acknowledgments Henkel Foundation for their generous sponsorship. My research and stay at the University of Oxford, one of the world’s foremost institutions of higher learning and scholarship, would not have been possible without them. Oxford for me will always be connected with many warm and happy memories. It is an experience I will cherish always. PREFACE The State and the Media he media have long been used to shape public opin- ion. Stirring aspirations for social and political reform, Tthe press has often been at loggerheads with the politi- cal elite. Changing News, Changing Realities examines the evolution of media censorship in Egypt from the monarchy to the present. It traces how direct censorship and govern- ment ownership of the media has given way to other forms of information management, looking into the processes and factors causing censorship walls to fall and the intricate dance between the authorities and the public that have contributed to a broader media space. Censorship and free expression involve a dynamic push and pull from various directions – the state, police, military, intelligence services, the religious estab- lishment, and self-appointed protectors of social morality on one side versus journalists, artists, novelists, filmmakers, dis- sidents, and bloggers on the other. The targets of censorship represent a challenge to entrenched interests. National security and maintaining public order have been high on the agenda of the censorship regime. This was the case during the era of the monarchy and British occupation and even more so in the aftermath of the 1952 Free Officers’ revo- lution, where political expression was tightly controlled in a 1 2 Preface manner unprecedented in Egypt’s recent past. The press, film industry, and publishing houses were nationalised. An addi- tional measure of control was instituted through a network of state-run cultural institutions that created a more restricted space for private initiative and the arts. Through the presiden- cies of Gamal Abd al-Nasser, Anwar Sadat, and Hosni Mubarak authoritarianism has remained a fixture in Egyptian politics and society. The press has been kept in check not just by laws but often through the reach and influence of the security apparatus. Satellite television and the internet, modern methods of evading government minders, have signalled the collapse of the information regime, and the state has lost its near-total ability to set the media agenda. The sheer volume of information and communications movement is beyond the capacity of the state to apply the same controls that worked so effectively a genera- tion ago. Private broadcast media represent a greater challenge to the authorities since they reach a mass audience in a nation where the illiteracy rate stands at just under a third of the popu- lation and newspaper sales are still low relative to population. The media space has widened by the state willingly or unwillingly allowing greater room for expression, enterpris- ing journalists and bloggers brave enough to break taboos, popular movements and activism expanding as much as secu- rity interests will allow, and social media – the newest mass communication tool – which has amplified the voice of the ‘street’, irreversibly altering the censorship equation. But was the media’s new ‘right to bark’ having a negligible effect in undermining an entrenched security state or would the cumu- lative efforts of a freer press enable action capable of politically TheStateandtheMedia 3 transforming Egypt’s future? The response to that question came when popular revolution erupted on 25 January 2011, on the heels of mass protests in neighbouring Tunisia that ousted that nation’s dictator. Eventually it was not enough simply to permit a wider space for speech. Political action was taking form online – Facebook was not only the freest press in Egypt, it was a mobilisation tool, pushing the barriers of speech and action in a tightly con- trolled police state. The call to revolution was announced on the ‘We are all Khaled Said’ Facebook page, begun in memory of a young man senselessly beaten to death by police in Alexandria seven months earlier. Khaled Said’s image would become the icon of a popular uprising to bring down the country’s pres- ent-day pharaoh. Eighteen days altered the future of Egypt’s media, shattering barriers of fear and censorship that have held together an autocratic regime. Yet after Hosni Mubarak’s down- fall, the country’s military rulers have used various strategies to fence in a discordant media. As Egypt’s first freely elected pres- ident, turning his back on campaign pledges, consolidates the power of his office and dominant Islamist parties hold political sway, the struggles for democratic governance and a free press are far from over. I Since the Printing Press 1 Press Beginnings in Egypt If all mankind minus one were of one opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind. (John Stuart Mill, British philosopher) If you speak out, don’t be afraid, and if you’re afraid, don’t speak up. (Egyptian proverb) Stimulated by the French experience with printing during Napoleon Bonaparte’s expedition to Egypt in 1798–1801, the country’s Ottoman ruler, Muhammad Ali (r. 1805–48), initi- ated the production of printing facilities by sending a delegation to Milan, Italy, to learn how it was done. Seven years later, in 1822, the Bulaq Press was inaugurated, with its first publication being an Italian–Arabic dictionary.1 The new government press printed items such as technical manuals for the military and other official documents for civil servants, books in European languages, Arabic translations, medical and school texts, and an Arabic edition of the Arabian Nights. The press was also part of Muhammad Ali’s commitment to broadening education. The Bulaq Press was not restricted by official laws – until its supervisor, Nicola Masabiki, carelessly printed a poem by 7 8 PressBeginningsinEgypt an Italian that demeaned the Islamic faith. When Egypt’s ruler found out, he issued a decree on 13 July 1823 that became the first BIBLIOTHECA ALEXANDRINA act of censorship, forbidding the publication of any work that did not have his official permission.2 Muhammad Ali also supervised the first Egyptian newspaper, an official bulletin useful in manag- ing a government bureaucracy called al-Waq’i‘ al-misriya (Egyp- Muhammad Ali tian Events), printed in both Turkish and Arabic, which he founded in 1828. It was not long before newspapers in Arabic and French and other printed material became a regular part of Egyptian life.
Recommended publications
  • UNIVERSITY of CALIFORNIA Santa Barbara Egyptian
    UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA Santa Barbara Egyptian Urban Exigencies: Space, Governance and Structures of Meaning in a Globalising Cairo A Thesis submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree Master of Arts in Global Studies by Roberta Duffield Committee in charge: Professor Paul Amar, Chair Professor Jan Nederveen Pieterse Assistant Professor Javiera Barandiarán Associate Professor Juan Campo June 2019 The thesis of Roberta Duffield is approved. ____________________________________________ Paul Amar, Committee Chair ____________________________________________ Jan Nederveen Pieterse ____________________________________________ Javiera Barandiarán ____________________________________________ Juan Campo June 2014 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to thank my thesis committee at the University of California, Santa Barbara whose valuable direction, comments and advice informed this work: Professor Paul Amar, Professor Jan Nederveen Pieterse, Professor Javiera Barandiarán and Professor Juan Campo, alongside the rest of the faculty and staff of UCSB’s Global Studies Department. Without their tireless work to promote the field of Global Studies and committed support for their students I would not have been able to complete this degree. I am also eternally grateful for the intellectual camaraderie and unending solidarity of my UCSB colleagues who helped me navigate Californian graduate school and come out the other side: Brett Aho, Amy Fallas, Tina Guirguis, Taylor Horton, Miguel Fuentes Carreño, Lena Köpell, Ashkon Molaei, Asutay Ozmen, Jonas Richter, Eugene Riordan, Luka Šterić, Heather Snay and Leila Zonouzi. I would especially also like to thank my friends in Cairo whose infinite humour, loyalty and love created the best dysfunctional family away from home I could ever ask for and encouraged me to enroll in graduate studies and complete this thesis: Miriam Afifiy, Eman El-Sherbiny, Felix Fallon, Peter Holslin, Emily Hudson, Raïs Jamodien and Thomas Pinney.
    [Show full text]
  • Alia Mossallam 200810290
    The London School of Economics and Political Science Hikāyāt Sha‛b – Stories of Peoplehood Nasserism, Popular Politics and Songs in Egypt 1956-1973 Alia Mossallam 200810290 A thesis submitted to the Department of Government of the London School of Economics for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, London, November 2012 1 Declaration I certify that the thesis I have presented for examination for the PhD degree of the London School of Economics and Political Science is solely my own work. The copyright of this thesis rests with the author. Quotation from it is permitted, provided that full acknowledgement is made. This thesis may not be reproduced without my prior written consent. I warrant that this authorisation does not, to the best of my belief, infringe the rights of any third party. I declare that my thesis consists of 99,397 words (excluding abstract, table of contents, acknowledgments, bibliography and appendices). Statement of use of third party for editorial help I confirm that parts of my thesis were copy edited for conventions of language, spelling and grammar by Naira Antoun. 2 Abstract This study explores the popular politics behind the main milestones that shape Nasserist Egypt. The decade leading up to the 1952 revolution was one characterized with a heightened state of popular mobilisation, much of which the Free Officers’ movement capitalized upon. Thus, in focusing on three of the Revolution’s main milestones; the resistance to the tripartite aggression on Port Said (1956), the building of the Aswan High Dam (1960- 1971), and the popular warfare against Israel in Suez (1967-1973), I shed light on the popular struggles behind the events.
    [Show full text]
  • Incarceration As a Gateway to Wonder in the Poetry of Ahmed Fouad Negm
    Contemporary Literary Review India CLRI Print ISSN 2250-3366 | Online ISSN 2394-6075 Vol. 7, No. 4: CLRI November 2020 | p 1-27 Incarceration as a Gateway to Wonder in the Poetry of Ahmed Fouad Negm Ahsan Ul Haq Ph D Research Scholar, Dept. of English, University of Kashmir, Srinagar, J & K. Abstract Ahmed Fouad Negm (1929-2013), was an Egyptian poet writing poetry in colloquial Arabic. He is one of the most celebrated revolutionary poet of Egypt. Negm was arrests and imprisoned multiple times for his outspoken and dissent voice. It was behind the prison walls that he found his voice. His prison poetry has strong impact on the minds of Egyptian folk, and inspires resistance against the dictatorship and regimes. Negm, remains the most popular and vernacular poet of Egypt. Typifying the artist’s progress, from inside the prison/jail Negm continues to speak for the voiceless Egyptians. This paper is an attempt study his prison poetry, and how jail/prison infused spark in his art. The paper will Contemporary Literary Review India | pISSN 2250-3366 / eISSN 2394-6075 | Vol. 7, No. 4: CLRI November 2020 | Page 1 Incarceration as a Gateway to Wonder in the Poetry of Ahmed Fouad Negm | Ahsan Ul haq examine some of the best prison testimonials translate in English. Keywords: Ahmed Fouad Negm, prison/jail, incarceration/imprisonment, revolution, poetry. Introduction The themes of incarceration and exile are predominant in the poetry of Egyptian Vernacular poet, Ahmed Fouad Negm (1929-2013), who spent eighteen years of his life prisons. Negm was nicknamed as Al-Fagomi (the impulsive).
    [Show full text]
  • 9783110726305.Pdf
    Shared Margins ZMO-Studien Studien des Leibniz-Zentrum Moderner Orient Herausgegeben von Ulrike Freitag Band 41 Samuli Schielke and Mukhtar Saad Shehata Shared Margins An Ethnography with Writers in Alexandria after the Revolution This publication was supported by the Leibniz Open Access Monograph Publishing Fund. ISBN 978-3-11-072677-0 e-ISBN (PDF) 978-3-11-072630-5 e-ISBN (EPUB) 978-3-11-072636-7 DOI https://doi.org/10.1515/ 9783110726305 This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial- NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. For details go to https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ Library of Congress Control Number: 2021937483 Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data are available in the internet at http://dnb.dnb.de. © 2021 Samuli Schielke and Mukhtar Saad Shehata Cover image: Eman Salah writing in her notebook. Photo by Samuli Schielke, Alexandria, 2015. Printing and binding: CPI books GmbH, Leck www.degruyter.com To Mahmoud Abu Rageh (1971–2018) Contents Acknowledgments ix On names, pronouns, and spelling xiii List of illustrations xiv Introduction: Where is literature? Samuli Schielke 1 Where is literature? 2 Anecdotal evidence 5 Outline of chapters 11 Part I. About writing Samuli Schielke, Mukhtar Saad Shehata 1 Why write, and why not stop? 15 An urge to express 16 ‘Something that has me in it’ 21 Why not stop? 27 A winding path through milieus 31 2 Infrastructures of imagination 39 The formation of scenes 43 A provincial setting 48 The Writers’ Union 51 Mukhtabar al-Sardiyat 54 El Cabina 56 Fabrica 60 Lines of division 63 Milieus at intersection 71 Openings and closures 73 3 The writing of lives 77 Materialities of marginality 79 The symposium as life 84 Being Abdelfattah Morsi 91 How to become a writer in many difficult steps 96 Holding the microphone 101 ‘I hate reality’ 105 ‘It’s a piece of me’ 107 Outsides of power 111 viii Contents Part II.
    [Show full text]
  • The Interface of Religious and Political Conflict in Egyptian Theatre
    The Interface of Religious and Political Conflict in Egyptian Theatre Dissertation Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of The Ohio State University By Amany Youssef Seleem, Stage Directing Diploma Graduate Program in Theatre The Ohio State University 2013 Dissertation Committee: Lesley Ferris, Advisor Nena Couch Beth Kattelman Copyright by Amany Seleem 2013 Abstract Using religion to achieve political power is a thematic subject used by a number of Egyptian playwrights. This dissertation documents and analyzes eleven plays by five prominent Egyptian playwrights: Tawfiq Al-Hakim (1898- 1987), Ali Ahmed Bakathir (1910- 1969), Samir Sarhan (1938- 2006), Mohamed Abul Ela Al-Salamouni (1941- ), and Mohamed Salmawi (1945- ). Through their plays they call attention to the dangers of blind obedience. The primary methodological approach will be a close literary analysis grounded in historical considerations underscored by a chronology of Egyptian leadership. Thus the interface of religious conflict and politics is linked to the four heads of government under which the playwrights wrote their works: the eras of King Farouk I (1920-1965), President Gamal Abdel Nasser (1918-1970), President Anwar Sadat (1918-1981), and President Hosni Mubarak (1928- ). While this study ends with Mubarak’s regime, it briefly considers the way in which such conflict ended in the recent reunion between religion and politics with the election of Mohamed Morsi, a member of the Muslim Brotherhood, as president following the Egyptian Revolution of 2011. This research also investigates how these scripts were written— particularly in terms of their adaptation from existing canonical work or historical events and the use of metaphor—and how they were staged.
    [Show full text]
  • Forgotten in the Diaspora: the Palestinian Refugees in Egypt
    Forgotten in the Diaspora: The Palestinian Refugees in Egypt, 1948-2011 Lubna Ahmady Abdel Aziz Yassin Middle East Studies Center (MEST) Spring, 2013 Thesis Advisor: Dr. Sherene Seikaly Thesis First Reader: Dr. Pascale Ghazaleh Thesis Second Reader: Dr. Hani Sayed 1 Table of Contents I. CHAPTER ONE: PART ONE: INTRODUCTION……………………………………………...…….4 A. PART TWO: THE RISE OF THE PALESTINIAN REFUGEE PROBLEM…………………………………………………………………………………..……………..13 B. AL-NAKBA BETWEEN MYTH AND REALITY…………………………………………………14 C. EGYPTIAN OFFICIAL RESPONSE TO THE PALESTINE CAUSE DURING THE MONARCHAL ERA………………………………………………………………………………………25 D. PALESTINE IN THE EGYPTIAN PRESS DURING THE INTERWAR PERIOD………………………………………………………………………………………………..…….38 E. THE PALESTINIAN REFUGEES IN EGYPT, 1948-1952………………………….……….41 II. CHAPTER TWO: THE NASSER ERA, 1954-1970 A. HISTORICAL BACKGROUND…………………………………………………………………….…45 B. THE EGYPTIAN-PALESTINIAN RELATIONS, 1954-1970……………..………………..49 C. PALESTINIANS AND THE NASEERIST PRESS………………………………………………..71 D. PALESTINIAN SOCIAL ORGANIZATIONS………………………………………………..…..77 E. LEGAL STATUS OF PALESTINIAN REFUGEES IN EGYPT………………………….…...81 III. CHAPTER THREE: THE SADAT ERA, 1970-1981 A. HISTORICAL BACKGROUND……………………………………………………………………….95 B. EGYPTIAN-PALESTINIAN RELATIONS DURING THE SADAT ERA…………………102 C. THE PRESS DURING THE SADAT ERA…………………………………………….……………108 D. PALESTINE IN THE EGYPTIAN PRESS DURING THE SADAT ERA……………….…122 E. THE LEGAL STATUS OF PALESTINIAN REFUGEES DURING THE SADAT ERA……………………………………………………………………………………………………….…129 IV. CHAPTER FOUR:
    [Show full text]
  • Tests for Egyptian Journalists
    Tests for Egyptian Journalists Reporting Truth, Fighting Censors, Earning a Wage, and Staying Alive in Times of Turmoil By Naomi Sakr n a classic essay in the Journal of Democracy in 2002, “The End of the Transition Paradigm,” democratization analyst Thomas Carothers questioned the assump- Ition that elections are the be-all and end-all of democracy. His argument seems especially apt in Egypt’s case. One mistake, according to Carothers, is to believe that the political and economic effects of decades of dictatorship can be brushed aside. Another is to imagine that state institutions under dictatorship functioned sufficiently well that they can be merely modified and need not be entirely rebuilt. Political scien- tist Sheri Berman, writing in Foreign Affairs in 2013, made similar points about what she called the “pathologies of dictatorship.” These leave a poisonous aftermath of pent-up distrust and animosity, she said, bereft of political bodies capable of respond- ing to or even channeling popular grievances. In Egypt, media institutions, largely controlled by the state since soon after the country became a republic in 1952, are part of this problem, but they can also be part of a future solution. To the extent that news media contribute to framing public discussion, the closer they get to representing the full plurality of interests and viewpoints in society, and the more they report verified information rather than prejudice, rumors, and lies, the more likely it is that different social groups will understand each other and make policy choices that are collectively beneficial. How media pluralism is achieved depends on history.
    [Show full text]
  • Pdf 582.97 K
    Journal of Association of Arab Universities for Tourism and Hospitality Volume 12 - Dec 2015 - No 2 - Pages: (51 : 78) King Farouk and the Wafd’s Relations with the United States After the 1952 Revolution (1952-1957) Noha Osman Azmy Associate Professor, Tourism Guidance Department, Faculty of Tourism and Hotels, Sadat City University Abstract: King Farouk was deposed and forced to leave Egypt after the 1952 Revolution. Under the demand of the political purification, the Wafd party was dissolved and its leaders were imprisoned or kept under house arrest. The year 1955 marked the first contact between the Farouk and Wafd with the United States. The tense relation between US and Nasser that year gave hope for both to return to power with US support. The study depended on the US State Department documents to represent these connections and to show the American opinion with it. Unlike the previous studies, the study approved that the first contact of Farouk to the US was in 1955 not in 1956; in which he commented on the Middle East situation, the US’s role in depositing him and described the new regime in Egypt. The Wafd also tried to gain the US support to return to power through two different approaches. One was ready to deal with Nasser but with parliamentary life depending on the Wafd’s popularity; the second was to depose Nasser and replace him with Naguib with the return of the Wafd party to the political scene. The study concluded that these connections reflected the deep ideological difference between Farouk and Wafd and showed that the US’s foreign policy was determined by its interest which was not anymore with either the Wafd or Farouk.
    [Show full text]
  • Downtown Cairo, Its Publics, and Urban Heterotopias
    OIS 3 (2015) ± Divercities: Competing Narratives and Urban Practices in Beirut, Cairo and Tehran Lucie Ryzova Strolling in Enemy Territory: Downtown Cairo, its Publics, and Urban Heterotopias <1> Downtown Cairo means many things to many people. To most middle-class Egyptians it is a dirty and dangerous place, associated with chaos and pollution. They extol its past glory, but rarely go there. Downtown©s elegant Italianate buildings, once the heart of a colonial metropolis, betray the déclassé glamour of a central business district that has seen better times. Taxi drivers often shun taking you there, anticipating traffic jams despite the wide boulevards designed on a grid-like pattern. Walking on foot, one can hardly navigate a path between street vendors who push pedestrians onto the road. Long abandoned by its elite inhabitants ± foreign and Egyptian alike ± in successive waves of centrifugal urbanization, Downtown remains a business district of sorts, but for a very different clientele. Its run-down B-movie theatres maintain their popularity by offering cheap seats in the face of competition from high-end theatres in Cairo©s many new malls in nearby suburbs; its wide boulevards are lined with cut-price (if not the cheapest) clothing stores with gaudy shop-windows, where lower-middle-class families come to buy their Sunday best. Downtown©s streets are a magnet for young low-income males who come here in the evening to hang out, to loiter. More recently, cheap Chinese motorcycles have become popular among this crowd, adding a layer of petty crime, perpetrated by mounted purse-snatchers, to the threat of sexual harassment with which Downtown after dark has become increasingly associated over the past two decades.1 <2> This, however, is hardly all there is to Cairo©s city centre.
    [Show full text]
  • Strikes, Riots and Laughter
    Middle East Centre STRIKES, RIOTS AND LAUGHTER AL-HIMAMIYYA VILLAGE’S EXPERIENCE OF EGYPT’S 1918 PEASANT INSURRECTION Alia Mossallam LSE Middle East Centre Paper Series | 40 | September 2020 About the Middle East Centre The Middle East Centre builds on LSE’s long engagement with the Middle East and provides a central hub for the wide range of research on the region carried out at LSE. The Middle East Centre aims to develop rig- orous research on the societies, economies, polities and international relations of the region. The Centre promotes both specialised knowledge and public understanding of this crucial area, and has out- standing strengths in interdisciplinary research and in regional expertise. As one of the world’s leading social science institutions, LSE comprises departments covering all branches of the social sciences. The Middle East Centre harnesses this expertise to promote innovative research and training on the region. About the SMPM in the MENA Research Network Since the highly televised, tweeted and media- tised Arab uprisings, there has been a deluge of interest in social movements and contesta- tion from both inside and outside Middle East Studies, from the public, from policy-makers and from students. The LSE Middle East Centre has established the Social Movements and Popular Mobilisa- tion (SMPM) Research Network, which aims at bringing together academics and students undertaking relevant research. This network provides a platform for driving forward intel- lectual development and cutting-edge research in the field. As part of the network, a seminar series was set-up inviting academics to present their work. Papers are then published as part of the LSE Middle East Centre Paper Series.
    [Show full text]
  • In Siyaad Barre's Prison
    In Siyaad Barre’s Prison: A Brief Recollection Mahamud M. Yahya I. Introduction In my view and in the view of many witnesses of Somalia’s recent his- tory, an important element of the terrible abuse of power and authority during the dictatorial regime of the late Gen. Mohamed Siyaad Barre was the arbitrary and widespread detention of dissidents, political opponents, and even ordinary Somalis who just expressed an honest opinion on the state of affairs in their country. These incarcerations were usually without any charges, and, in the end, without trial. For this reason, men like Aden Abdillah Osman, the first President of the Somali Republic; Premier Abdirazak H. Hussein; the late Mohamed Ibrahim Egal, ex-President of the self-declared Somaliland Republic and former Prime Minister of Somalia; Abdillahi Issa, First Foreign Minister; Gen. Mohamed Abshir Muse, former Commander of Soma- lia’s Police Force; Michael Mariano, pioneer nationalist, Parliamen- tarian, and distinguished civil servant; Col. Abdillahi Yusuf, current President of the Transitional Federal Government of Somalia; the late Gen. Mohamed Farah Aideed, former USC leader; and Col. Jama Ali Jama, one-time president of the Puntland region; each had to spend months or years in detention, some in solitary confinement. But they were never brought to a real court of justice because they were simply being persecuted for reasons that included possibly rallying righteous disapproval and discontent, competition for power, or because Siyaad Barre disliked them personally. 77 Bildhaan Vol. 5 The injustices of the dictatorial military regime that turned many Somalis against that government—despite its popularity at the begin- ning of its reign in 1969—were, in the opinion of many experts on Somali affairs, the main cause behind the inception of the armed rebel- lions against the old regime and its eventual downfall in 1991.
    [Show full text]
  • Meet the Secret Rulers of the World the Truth About the Bohemian Grove by Alexander Cockburn 6-16-1
    Meet The Secret Rulers Of The World The Truth About The Bohemian Grove By Alexander Cockburn http://www.antiwar.com 6-16-1 Where's the fashionable rendezvous for the World's Secret Government? In the good old days when the Illuminati had a firm grip on things, it was wherever the Bilderbergers decided to pitch their tents. Then Nelson and David Rockefeller horned their way in, and the spotlight moved to the Trilateral Commission. Was there one secret government or two? Some said all the big decisions were taken in England, at Ditchley, not so far from the Appeasers' former haunts at Cliveden and only an hour by Learjet from Davos, which is where jumped up finance ministers and self-inflating tycoons merely pretend they rule the world. Secret World rulers spend a good deal of time in the air, whisking from Davos to APEC meetings somewhere in Asia, to Ditchley, to Sun Valley, Idaho, tho' mercifully no longer to the Clinton-favored Renaissance Weekend in Hilton Head, South Carolina. But comes next July 14 and every self-respecting member of the Secret World Government will be in a gloomy grove of redwoods alongside the Russian river in northern California, preparing to Banish Care for the 122nd time, prelude to three weeks drinking gin fizzes and hashing out the future of the world. If the avenging posses mustered by the Bohemian Grove Action Network manage this year to burst through the security gates at the Bohemian Grove, they will (to extrapolate from numerous eyewitness accounts of past sessions) find proofs most convincing to them that here indeed is the ruling crowd in executive session: hundreds of near-dead white men sitting by a lake listening to Henry Kissinger.
    [Show full text]